Empire of the Vampire

by Jay Kristoff

  “‘Know no shame, Little Lion.’ Greyhand shook his head, the ghost of a smile at his lips. ‘Old age and treachery can always overcome youth and skill.’

  “‘I’ll remember that.’

  “‘I’m sure you will.’

  “We shuffled from the Library toward the Infirmary, blood running down my throat and chest, red footprints behind us as Greyhand sighed. ‘I’ve known him since I was your age. I’d not have believed it unless I heard it from his own lips. Not Talon.’

  “I shook my head, sticky hand pressed to my bleeding neck. ‘If we spend all our lives in darkness, is it any wonder when darkness starts to live in us?’

  “‘Mmm.’ Greyhand looked to the heavens above. To the one watching over us. ‘Nothing is certain in this, save the love of God. Life is not a story you can tell, de León. It’s only a story you can live. The bright news is, you get to choose what kind yours will be. A story of horror, or a story of courage. A story of indulgence, or a story of duty. The story of a monster. Or the a story of a man.’

  “The doors to the Priory opened before us, and I saw light and warmth inside.

  “‘What will your story be?’”

  XIX

  ON THIS FIRE

  “I OPENED MY eyes, floating in the dark between dreaming and waking.

  “I sensed her before I saw her—the scent of her hair and the faintest notes of blood, entwined with the gentle perfume of dried herbs from the Infirmary outside. Turning my head, I found her beside my cot, quiet and still in the dark. For the thousandth time, I wondered what this place would be when she left it and me behind.

  “‘Astrid,’ I whispered.

  “She simply stared, her expression inscrutable; that mask she’d learned to wear as a mistress’s daughter in the Golden Halls. But her eyes were shining, deep and dark as the night above. And I wondered at the mystery of it all—that I’d come to these walls so far from home to meet a girl such as this. A girl I must now say good-bye to.

  “‘I should dump that pisspot on your head,’ she said.

  “‘… What?’

  “‘Of all the shit-brained, dropped-as-a-babe, pig-skulled, fucking…’

  “She stood swiftly, biting her lip to halt her tirade. The Infirmary was quiet as tombs, and raised voices would surely bring curious cats. But I could see fury in Astrid’s eyes as she glowered down at me, knuckles white at her sides.

  “‘They told me what you did. What you said to that hell-bitch Isabella.’

  “‘… I thought you’d be pleased. I’ve ended your exile.’

  “‘Nobody asked you to do that, Gabriel!’

  “‘Nor should you need to? I know how you feel about San Michon, Astrid. No hell so cruel as powerlessness, remember? You said you’d tear the wings off an angel to fly this cage. Well, now you can leave whenever you want.’

  “Her lips pressed thin, eyes glittering with anger. ‘Suppose I don’t want to leave?’

  “‘But you hate this place.’

  “‘And if hate had the steerage of my course, I’d already be gone. But it doesn’t!’

  “‘What are you talking about?’

  “She met my eyes and sighed. ‘Do you truly not know?’

  “I saw the plea in her gaze, and my stomach was lit by the wings of a hundred burning butterflies. I knew what she spoke of. Of course, I did. If I tried, I could still remember the bliss of her mouth on mine, the lonely, empty ache of wanting something I could never have. But I couldn’t have her. Because this was wrong.

  “All of this, wrong.

  “‘Astrid … there’s no future for you here. There’s no future in … this.’

  “‘You mean us.’

  “‘I mean I swore an oath before the Mothermaid and Martyrs and God Himself to love no woman. And if you stayed here, you’d soon be wed to him besides.’

  “‘You do love me, then…’

  “I turned away lest she see the answer in my eyes. But she sat on the bed beside me, pressed her hand to my cheek and forced me to look at her. To see her. She was the shadow on my thoughts when I tried to sleep. The fire in my dreams that bid me never wake.

  “‘Tell me you do not want me,’ she whispered.

  “‘Astrid…’

  “‘Tell me, and I will leave this place and never think of you again.’ A tear spilled down her cheek, caught trembling at the bow of her lips. ‘But if you do want me, Gabriel de León, then say it. Because only a coward would cherish the wanting of a thing and yet send it away. And I will not give my heart to a coward. I will give it to a lion.’

  “God and Martyrs, she was beautiful. That face shaped like heartbreak, like a secret unshared. Her eyes were darker than all the roads I’d walked and all the monstrous things I’d seen, and in them I knew I’d find a heaven if only I were willing to risk a hell.

  “‘Tell me you do not want me.’

  “‘I can’t,’ I whispered. ‘God help me, I can’t.’

  “‘Then take me, Gabriel.’ She lifted her chin, fierce and furious. ‘Take me, and God and Mothermaid and Martyrs be damned with us both.’

  “And there was nothing left then: no restraint, no law, no vow that could have held me anchored through her storm. I kissed her, hungry and hard, and in that kiss, I knew salvation and damnation. A vow I could truly keep.

  “On this fire, I would burn.

  “And there in the dark of that cell, we stripped each other bare, skin to skin. Her teeth nipped at my lip and her fingers wove through my hair, and she sat astride me and kissed away my every thought and fear. All hope abandoned to the flames between us. My fingertips traced her body, curve and valley, down to the shadow between her legs, the softness that had haunted my dreams. We were silent, the two of us, speaking only with eyes and hands and desperate, whispered breath, the fear of discovery thrilling us both, the glorious, wanton guilt of it somehow making all of it the sweeter.

  “Her lips were flame and frost upon my skin, kissing me in all the places mortal girls feared to tread. I kissed her just the same, sinking between her thighs as she plunged me into her mouth, and the taste of her near drove me mad. We moved slow in the dark, smothering our sighs in each other’s secrets until there was nothing but the inevitable, nothing but the fire awaiting us both. She clawed and she pleaded ‘Fuck me, fuck me’ and as I slipped into her, slow and deep and hard, there was nothing else in all the world that mattered. No divinity but the want in her eyes. No eternity in hell I wouldn’t have gladly suffered if I could have lived just one more moment of the heaven inside her.

  “We swayed together, her atop me now, the razors of my teeth brushing the satin of her skin, feeling her shiver as she whispered my name. And as the rush took hold, as I felt it singing inside me, she pressed her hands to my cheeks so she might meet my eyes. Desperate. Needing. Lips bruised like cherries.

  “‘Bite me,’ she breathed.

  “‘… What?’

  “‘Bite me, Gabriel.’

  “My teeth were sharp against my tongue, and I could see the pulse thudding down the milk-white silk of her throat. I wanted it, God help me, I wanted it so badly it was all I could see, all I could taste. But there was still enough of me left to push it back, away, my breath ragged in my lungs as she swayed atop me, deeper, faster, warm and so impossibly smooth, dancing me ever closer to my brink.

  “‘They’ll see,’ I whispered. ‘The mark…’

  “‘Here,’ she begged, running one hand over her breast. ‘Please.’

  “There’s no need deeper than to be desired. There’s no sweeter word under heaven than please. And I gave myself over to it utterly. Feeling her shiver as a dark growl rose up in my throat and the hunger took me whole. I seized a fistful of her hair, smiling as I dragged her in. A need on the edge of madness. A want on the edge of violence. And she groaned and pushed herself down onto me, deeper, harder, and my tongue slipped over her pebble-hard nipple and her nails clawed my back as the monster I was sank its fangs into her breast, piercing
the white and birthing the red.

  “She crushed us together, back arching, mouth open in a silent scream as the Kiss took hold. Her whole body began shaking, her legs wrapped tighter around me as she lost herself in the fire of it all and her blood—God, that impossible burning life—crashed across my tongue and into the very heart of me.

  “And I knew the color of bliss then. And its color was red.

  “I drank her, as a river drinks the rain. Drawn up into the crimson light of a sun long faded, so lost that I was only dimly aware of her slipping me free, finishing me with her hand, the death of me spurting across her skin as I swallowed just one more mouthful, just one more drop. Gasping, she tore herself loose from my mouth, and wounded, wanting, she crushed her lips to mine, iron and rust and salt between us. We sank into the ruin we’d made of my bed, our bodies slick, her cheek against my chest, and the all of her wrapped in my arms.

  “We lay there for an age in silence. In truth, I’d no knowing what to say. This was the road to hell, I knew. And both of us now walked it.

  “‘This is sin,’ I told her. ‘They will punish us for it. And God beside them.’

  “Astrid lifted her head, met my eyes.

  “‘But I don’t care,’ I breathed.

  “Her fingertips brushed my face, making me shiver. ‘We could leave?’

  “I shook my head, giving the answer she already had the keeping of. ‘You said you’d not give your heart to a coward. We couldn’t leave even if we wished it. And I don’t think either of us truly does.’

  “‘This will be our lot, then? Loving in the dark? Like liars?’

  “I kissed her brow, eyes closed tight. ‘Until the war is won. Until the song is sung.’

  “‘And then?’

  “‘Then us. Forever.’

  “She kissed me again, melting in my arms. A kiss of flames and tears, of sweetest sin, a kiss to which all others would be compared and found wanting. And if this was wrong, I decided, then let it be the wrong I’d die for. There, with that girl in my arms, I swore to God I would give all else—my blood, my life, my everything—if only he would let me have her.

  “Just. Her.”

  XX

  BROKEN GLASS

  GABRIEL FELL SILENT, staring at the silver she’d scribed on his skin. He heard the cry of a lovelorn wolf; a solitary howl out in that long and lonely dark.

  He held his empty wineglass in numb fingers, feeling the liquor rushing bloodwarm in his veins. If he tried hard enough, he could reach out and touch her now. He had but to open the window to his mind’s eye and find her there, waiting, smiling, untouched by the teeth of time. Long black hair and deep black eyes and a shadow that weighed a ton.

  “You served San Michon five more years,” Jean-François said, drawing long, smooth lines in his accursed book. “Five years in which your name became legend. You led the attack on Báih Sìde and liberated the Dyvok slaughterfarms at Triúrbaile when you were only nineteen. You freed Qadir and broke the siege at Tuuve at twenty. You slew elders of the Dyvok in Ossway, Chastain in the Sūdhaem, burned out a nest of ancien Ilon that threatened the Crown itself. The Black Lion, they called you. Your name was a clarion call. A hymn in the houses of the holy, and a curse in the Courts of the Blood.”

  The vampire stopped drawing long enough to meet Gabriel’s eyes.

  “How did it all come undone?”

  “Patience, coldblood,” Gabriel replied.

  Anger flashed in the vampire’s gaze, swift and black. “No, Silversaint. I have shown the patience of angels eternal. You will finish this chapter now. How did it end?”

  Gabriel met the monster’s eyes, lifted his tattooed hands into the light.

  “Patience.”

  Jean-François blinked at the name across the silversaint’s fingers.

  “Your daughter.”

  Gabriel reached to the bottle, spilling the wine into his goblet, deep and red. He pressed the glass to his lips and drank deep. The wolf sang again out in the dark, alone and heartsick. It was an age before the silversaint conjured voice enough to speak.

  “We didn’t plan it. Astrid and I. We never imagined it. She swore to the Silver Sorority, became Mistress of the Aegis in San Michon. I, the young paragon of the Ordo Argent. We lived as she prophesied, stealing our moments in the dark when duty allowed. Fucking like thieves. But it was enough. She was enough.

  “We were careful. So careful that when she told me, hand to belly, I wondered if it was a sign from God. For one foolish moment, I thought it might not matter. My accolades were too many to count by then. Someone told me there were more babes named Gabriel that last year I served in San Michon than were gifted the name of the Emperor himself.”

  The Last Silversaint shook his head.

  “But of course, it changed everything. I had enemies aplenty by then. Outside San Michon, and within. The vanity Greyhand had warned me about was ever my weakness. I wasn’t a lamb, I was a fucking lion, and I walked the earth like one. But the light that burns twice as bright burns half as long. And the poppy that grows too tall gets cut down to size. Oathbreaker, they called me. Blasphemer. There’s a great deal you can get away with if your name grows large enough, coldblood. But this wasn’t some pretty painted courtesan who’d welcomed me into her bed. This was a sister of the Silver Sorority. And no matter how many hymns they sing for you, no matter how many babes are named for you, it’s a forgiving priest indeed who pardons the man who makes a cuckold of God.

  “The brethren demanded I set Astrid aside. Even Greyhand. And I told them where they could shove their fucking demands. So, she and I were excommunicated. They let me keep my aegis at least—probably for fear of losing their hands. But all those years of service, all those lives I’d saved, and no one in San Michon was even allowed to come wish us farewell. Finch, Theo, the Phils, Sév, Chloe—nobody. We climbed onto Justice, Astrid’s arms about my waist, and alone, friendless, we rode into the dark.”

  Gabriel’s smile was like the sun rising.

  “But we weren’t alone for long. And never again. God still gave us one more blessing. A tiny, beautiful blessing, with her mama’s smile and her papa’s eyes, and no hint of the curse that flowed in his paleblood veins.”

  Gabriel shook his head, voice soft with wonder.

  “The first time I held her in my arms, I cried more than she did. I used to watch her while she slept as a babe. Just stand above her crib for hours and wonder how the hell someone like me had made something so beautiful. And as she grew, I realized she was the reason I’d been put on this earth. Not to lead armies or defend cities or save an empire. Looking into her eyes, I knew it, like I knew the taste of my wife’s lips or the song of the blood. Goodness could come of sin, and she was proof. She was perfect. Great Redeemer, she was everything. Our Patience.”

  Gabriel stretched out his legs before him, ankles crossed, leathers whispering. Tipping his head back, he finished off his wine, a droplet running down his chin. Reaching for the Monét, he found it empty, cursing under his breath.

  “Hearts only bruise,” the vampire murmured. “They never break.”

  Gabriel nodded. “So Astrid would often tell me.”

  “A pretty sentiment.”

  “A fucking lie.”

  “Where did the three of you go?”

  Gabriel’s eyes were fixed on the goblet in his hand. The reflections of the lantern’s flame playing like fireflies on the blood-dark drop in the bottom. Thumb tracing the arc of the teardrop scars down his cheek, he looked to that pale moth still beating its wings in vain upon the lantern’s chimney, heedless and hopeless.

  “De León?”

  “Your voice will never feel so tiny as when you’re screaming at God,” he whispered.

  “… What?”

  Gabriel blinked, his eyes coming into focus. He looked up at the historian and slowly shook his head. “I don’t want to talk about them anymore.”

  “Must we do this again? My Empress demands her tale.”

/>   “And she’ll have it.” Gabriel’s grip tightened on his empty glass, knuckles white. “But I don’t feel like talking about ma famille right now.”

  “You are a prisoner here. Completely within our power. For all intents and purposes, Chevalier, you are my slave. So apologies,” the vampire said, leaning forward, “but has it somehow been conveyed to you that it makes any difference at all how you feel?”

  The wineglass shattered in Gabriel’s hand. A hundred glittering shards splintering in his fist and falling to the stone. The silversaint winced and opened his fingers, looking at the blood dripping, dark and sweet and thick.

  Jean-François was suddenly standing. Though he barely seemed to move at all, the historian was across the other side of the room, bristling with threat. A black hunger filled his eyes as he watched the red drip, drip, drip.

  “Are you insane?”

  Gabriel smiled, held out his wounded hand. “Frightened of a little blood, vampire?”

  Jean-François hissed, pearl-white fangs bared, “If I fear anything, de León, it is what I would do to you if I let my hunger have its head.”

  “And what do you think you’d do to me, coldblood?” Gabriel’s eyes narrowed. “Before your Empress has the whole of her tale?”

  The Last Silversaint rose from his chair and stepped forward, bleeding hand outstretched. Jean-François took another step back.

  “Seems we’re all someone’s slave.”

  “Meline!” Jean-François bellowed.

  The door flew open in a heartbeat, the thrall woman on the threshold in her long, black gown. Her eyes were wide. One hand beneath her bodice. “Master?”

  The vampire blinked, the dark shadow that had filled his eyes dimming. He smoothed down his frockcoat and plucked at the ruffled hems of his sleeves.

  “Our guest has cut himself.”

  The woman released the weapon she had hidden in her bodice. A dagger, mostlike, though it was difficult for Gabriel to tell. She dropped into a curtsey, made her way to the silversaint’s side, taking his hand. Gentle as she was, Gabriel could still feel the terrible strength in her grip; the power gifted from nightly sups at her master’s wrist. The silversaint’s eyes were still fixed on the vampire’s, his lips curling into a grim smile as he saw that, despite regaining his composure, the creature still refused to move closer.